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Seminar "Selected Topics in Mathematics"
Online edition

Upcoming talks:
24 April 2025 (Thursday, 3pm UK time, UTC+01:00)
Prof. Anna Pratoussevitch, University of Liverpool

Farey Bryophylla

Abstract.

The construction of the Farey tessellation in the hyperbolic plane starts with a finitely generated group of symmetries of an ideal triangle and induces a remarkable fractal structure on the boundary of the hyperbolic plane, encoding every element by the continued fraction related to the structure of the tessellation. The problem of finding a generalisation of this construction to the higher dimensional hyperbolic spaces has remained open for many years. In this paper we make the first steps towards a generalisation in the three-dimensional case. We introduce conformal bryophylla, a class of subsets of the boundary of the hyperbolic \(3\)-space which possess fractal properties similar to the Farey tessellation. We classify all conformal bryophylla and study the properties of their limiting sets. This is joint work with Oleg Karpenkov.

01 May 2025 (Thursday, 3pm UK time, UTC+01:00)




TBA.

08 May 2025 (Thursday, 3pm UK time, UTC+01:00)




TBA.

Past talks:
13 February 2024 (Thursday, 3pm UK time, UTC)
Prof. Jeffrey Vaaler, University of Texas at Austin

Sums of small fractional parts and a problem of Littlewood

( Video link)
Abstract.

PDF abstract here.

27 February 2025 (Thursday, 3pm UK time, UTC)
Prof. Anthony Nixon, Lancaster University

Stable cuts, NAC-colourings and flexible realisations of graphs

Abstract.

A (2-dimensional) realisation of a graph G is a pair \((G,p)\), where \(p\) maps the vertices of \(G\) to \(\mathbb{R}^2\). A realisation is flexible if it can be continuously deformed while keeping the edge lengths fixed, and rigid otherwise. Similarly, a graph is flexible if its generic realisations are flexible, and rigid otherwise. We show that a minimally rigid graph has a flexible realisation with positive edge lengths if and only if it is not a 2-tree. This confirms a conjecture of Grasegger, Legersky and Schicho. Our proof is based on a characterisation of graphs with \(n\) vertices and \(2n-3\) edges and without stable cuts due to Le and Pfender. We also strengthen a result of Chen and Yu, who proved that every graph with at most \(2n-4\) edges has a stable cut, by showing that every flexible graph has a stable cut. Additionally, we investigate the number of NAC-colourings in various graphs. A NAC-colouring is a type of edge colouring introduced by Grasegger, Legersky and Schicho, who showed that the existence of such a colouring characterises the existence of a flexible realisation with positive edge lengths.

This is joint work with Clinch, Garamvolgyi, Haslegrave, Huynh and Legersky.

13 March 2025 (Thursday, 3pm UK time, UTC)
Prof. Maxim Arnold, UT Dallas

Circle patterns and ideal polygon folding

Abstract.

Folding of the ideal polygon in its \(j\)–th vertex reflects the vertex in the corresponding short diagonal. We show that compositions of such foldings along any Coxeter element provide Liouville integrable system on the moduli space of ideal polygons. This result also provides integrability for Shramm circle patterns. This is joint work with Anton Izosimov.

20 March 2025 (Thursday, 3pm UK time, UTC)
Prof. Mikhail Gabdullin, University of Illinois

Primes with small primitive roots

Abstract.

Let \(\delta(p)\) tend to zero arbitrarily slowly as \(p\to\infty\). We exhibit an explicit set \(\mathcal{S}\) of primes \(p\), defined in terms of simple functions of the prime factors of \(p-1\), for which the least primitive root of \(p\) is at most \( p^{1/4-\delta(p)}\) for all \(p\in \mathcal{S}\), where \(\#\{p\leq x: p\in \mathcal{S}\} \sim \pi(x)\) as \(x\to\infty\). This is a joint work with Kevin Ford and Andrew Granville.

27 March 2025 (Thursday, 3pm UK time, UTC)
Dr. Luke Jeffreys, University of Bristol

On the complement of the Lagrange spectrum in the Markov spectrum

Abstract.

Initially studied by Markov around \(1880\), the Lagrange and Markov spectra are complicated subsets of the real line that play a crucial role in the study of Diophantine approximation and the study of binary quadratic forms. In the \(1920\)s, Perron gave an amazingly useful description of the spectra in terms of continued fractions and, in the \(1960\)s, Freiman demonstrated that the Lagrange spectrum is a strict subset of the Markov spectrum. It still remains a difficult task to find points in the complement of the Lagrange spectrum within the Markov spectrum and modern research is focussed on further developing our understanding of this complement.

In this talk, I will introduce these spectra, discussing the historical results above, and speak about recent works with Harold Erazo, Carlos Matheus and Carlos Gustavo Moreira finding new points in the complement and obtaining better lower bounds for its Hausdorff dimension.

10 April 2025 (Thursday, 3pm UK time, UTC+01:00)
Amanda Burcroff, Harvard University

Combining Combinatorics and Mirror Symmetry in Cluster Algebra Positivity

Abstract.

The theory of cluster algebras gives a combinatorial framework for understanding the previously opaque nature of certain algebraic and geometric spaces. Cluster algebras are celebrated for their intriguing positivity properties, which unify positivity phenomena in many areas of math and physics. Two distinct proofs of this positivity have emerged, one combinatorial and the other using scattering diagrams from mirror symmetry. Combining these approaches, we give a directly computable, manifestly positive, and elementary (yet highly nontrivial) formula describing generalized cluster scattering diagrams in rank \(2\). Using this, we prove the Laurent positivity of generalized cluster algebras of all ranks, resolving a conjecture of Chekhov and Shapiro from 2014. This is joint work with Kyungyong Lee and Lang Mou.

17 April 2025 (Thursday, 3pm UK time, UTC+01:00)
Prof. Shin-ichi Tanigawa, University of Tokyo

Identifying Generic Points from Non-Generic Measurements

Abstract.

The generic global rigidity characterization by Gortler, Healy, and Thurston is one of the most significant results in graph rigidity theory. In particular, this characterization implies that global rigidity is a generic property of graphs: either every generic realization of a graph in \(d\)-space is globally rigid, or none of them are. Although a few variations are known, our understanding of its extendability to other rigidity models remains limited.

In this talk, we examine the generic rigidity problem within the framework of the point identifiability problem, by Cruickshank, Mohammadi, Nixon, and Tanigawa. We present several successful examples in \(\mathscr{l}_p\)-rigidity and tensor completion and discuss unsolved problems.

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